Am I allowed to add fire door seals to existing fire doors?

[Guest JeenashMis]

We have had a recent fire inspection and have been advised that we need to fit smoke seals and intumescent strips to our existing fire doors which are over 30 years old.

The Building Manager has raised concerns that we should not be modifying or adapting exsiting fire doors and this may be in breach of Building Regs? Is this correct?

We have been advised that intumescent strips are within the lippings of some of the existing doors and in order to fit smoke seals we will need to rout out the door edges to fit the smoke seal.

Can you please advise if we can modify existing door sets?

Many Thanks

[Tom Sutton]

Upgrading a fire door IMO is not a material alteration therefore not subject to Building Regulation control, check out page 20 of Approved Document B (Fire Safety) or talk to your Building Control department. If a fire door has the intumescent strip under the lippings then they should not be routed as this is part of the fire door specification and the cold smoke seals should be stuck on using self adhesive seals. You can upgrade fire doors in certain situations it all depends on your Fire Risk Assessment, have you spoken to the your FR assessor and the responsible Person?

[Tom Sutton]

Further to my above submission check out http://www.firesafe.org.uk/fire-doors/ for more information.

[Guest Jeenash]

Thanks for your advice.

If we were asked to carry out the rebating into existing FD30/FD60 doors and subsequently fit the relevant seals, As a company what qualification would we need to attain and who could suggest we contact to put this into practice.

[Tom Sutton]

I would suggest you contact Intumescent Fire Seals Association they should be able to help you.